The translation of Orosius embodies a considerable piece of original matter. Orosius had given, in the opening of his work, a geographical sketch of Europe and Asia. In the translation a large addition is made to the geography of Europe, and it was an addition not merely to this book, but (so far as appears) to the stock of existing geographical knowledge. This insertion consists of three parts, 1. A map-like description of Central Europe; 2. Narrative of Ohthere, who had voyaged round the North Cape; 3. Voyage of Wulfstan from Denmark along the southern and eastern coasts of the Baltic. Ohthere’s Narrative is connected with King Alfred by name:—“Ohthere sæde his hlaforde Ælfrede kynincge thæt he ealra Northmanna northmest bude,” i.e., Ohthere said to his lord, King Alfred, that he of all Northmen had the most northerly home.
The translation of Beda skips lightly over much of the twenty-two preliminary chapters, giving good measure, however, to the description of Britain and to the martyrdom of St. Alban. All about Gregory and Augustine is full. So also about Eadwine, Oswald, Aidan, Oswy, and St. Chad. (But all that famous section (iii. 25, 26) which describes the crisis between the churches, the synod of Whitby, and the Scotian departure, is omitted altogether). Full measure is given to Theodore, the synod of Hertford, Wilfrid, Queen Ætheldrith, Hilda, and Cædmon. So also Cuthbert and John of Hexham. Fully rendered are the failure of the Irish and the success of the Anglian missions to Germany; also the visions which we may call Dantesque. (The whole section about Adamnan’s influence and writings (v. 15, 16, 17) is omitted.) But about Aldhelm and his writings; also Daniel, bishop of Winchester; the end of Wilfrid; and about Albinus, the successor of Adrian, is fully rendered.
The Anglo-Saxon Gospels must be mentioned here. This is a book about which we have no external information, and the manuscripts are comparatively late. But the diction leads us to place it in or about the times of Alfred.
It is probable that the “Beowulf” is the product of the same reign; while the volume of sacred poetry that is designated by the name of “Cædmon” appears (at least the first part of it) to be either of this time or possibly older.
If with the above we embrace in our view the Laws of this reign and the evidence of contemporary work in the Chronicles, we must be struck with the extent of this great muster of native literature. But we shall hardly do it justice unless we remember that this is the first national display of the kind in the progress of modern Europe. Native poetry had been cultivated in the Anglian period, and there had been a vernacular apparatus to assist the study of Latin, but of a varied and comprehensive literature in English or any other European vernacular, we find no trace until now. We must not look upon Alfred’s translations as mere helps to the Latin. What with the freedom and independence of treatment, and what with the original additions, they have a large claim to the character of domestic products. The very scheme itself, that of using translation as a medium of culture, which is now so familiar to us, was then quite a novel idea. In his preface to the “Pastoral,” the king casts about for precedents, and he finds none but the translations of Scripture into Greek and into Latin, and these do not, in fact, make a true parallel. But he could hardly have used this argument without a conscious pride that he had in his mother tongue an instrument not unpractised, and not altogether unworthy to be the first of barbarian languages to tread in the footsteps of the Greek and Latin.
This, then (I comprise the matter of three previous chapters and of three that are to follow) is the “Anglo-Saxon”[117] literature, properly so called; for that expression, if used with technical exactness, affords a term of distinction for the later literature of the south as against the earlier literature of the north, which has been called the Anglian period.
[108] Asser’s “Life of Alfred,” in “Monumenta Historica Britannica,” 487a.
[109] It was published for the first time in 1871, being edited by Mr. Sweet for the Early English Text Society.
[110] Wanley’s “Catalogue,” p. 217.
[111] “Monumenta Historica Britannica,” 486 E.